‘The Play That Goes Wrong’ Gets a Night at the Theatre Right

Please know that I mean this in the most complimentary way: The Play That Goes Wrong is so, so stupid.

The Arts Club Theatre’s latest offering, on til August 16 at Granville Island’s Lindsay Family Stage, is the farciest of farces—two glorious hours of hi-jinx, buffoonery, slapstick misunderstandings and a lady shoved into a grandfather clock. I loved it.

Raised on a heavy diet of Frasier and high-school drama productions, perhaps I’m more susceptible to the delights of a slamming-door comedy than your average theatre aficionado, but it seems impossible to watch this Olivier Award-winning play (which follows the increasingly absurd unravelling of the fictional Cornley Drama Society’s newest production, The Murder at Haversham Manor) with a straight face. The chaos is impeccable, as directed by Josh Epstein, all taking place in a puzzle-box of a set designed by Ryan Cormack. As difficult as it is for cast and crew and alike to put on a flawless play, the technical expertise is even more impressive putting on a ‘bad’ one. As sloppy as this production is pretending to be, perfect timing is key—both for comedy and safety purposes. The moments I wasn’t laughing, I was wondering just how much they spent on insurance… and isn’t that ultimately the sign of a successful slapstick show?

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I could tell you about the comedy stunts and prop mishaps in detail but that would ruin the surprises that had the audience (and I don’t say this lightly) guffawing. I’ll only say that the show-within-a-show format offers some moments of thrilling kayfaybe—what wrestling nerds call the blurring of staged events and real ones—before the curtain even lifts.

In the lobby, for instance, a sad box of ill-fitting merch (“all child x-tra small [sad face]”) and posters for off-brand past productions (The Merry Wife of Windsor, Come From Close By, et cetera). As the audience filters in to their seats, ‘stagehands’ putter away putting their finishing touches on the already-crumbling set: one enlists the help of a well-meaning ticket-holder to hold things in place, another wanders the aisles begs for help finding their lost Vanessa Carlton CD. The ‘director’ (Praneet Akilla) gives a hopeful, straight-faced speech about the theatre company’s checkered past. It all sets the tone for what can only be described as a joyfully goofy night, where actors playing actors playing actors valiantly embody the age old entertainment-biz mantra: the show must go on.

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Tickets from $39; The Play that Goes Wrong, runs now through August 16 at the Lindsay Family Stage.